Patti LaBelle Quotes

Many a false step is made standing still.

Always respect yourself and don't go out there disrespecting yourself.

I'm 60, and I did 60-year-old women songs. I'm not trying to be the Hip-Hop Queen, although I am the original Hip Hop Queen.

I like hip-hop music, but some of the lyrics make me want to cry.

I'm still standing up there tall and strong every night that I perform.

I'm very shy in a crowd.

You've got to know business before you go to show business.

So if diva means giving your best, then yes, I guess I am a diva.

Here's the thing about faith: It gives us the strength to go on when we want to give in. It gives us the courage to get up when we want to lie down. It gives us the power to make a way out of no way when there ain't no way. Just as love can't make you strong until love has made you weak, well, faith can't lift you up until life has knocked you down. With faith or without it, we can't stop the waves. But with it, we don't need to. Because with it we can ride the surf.

You don't have to be an angel, just be someone who can give.

Every exit is an entrance to someplace else.

I never wanted to go on stage alone because if you mess up, who can you blame?

I never thought I would be singing for the world.

I just sing the stuff that makes me smile, makes me feel like I didn't sell myself out.

Anger is like the blade of a butcher knife - very difficult to hold on to for long without harming yourself.

Being honored at Berklee College of Music; I got a doctorate. I am Doctor Patti.

I think the race situation is getting better as far as people respecting each other goes. I think the race situation with entertainment is not that much better.

I was very shy. I'm still shy.

I've had 60 years of ups and downs, and all of the downs that I've had, I'm happy that I've had them because it's taught me to appreciate all the ups.

Real divas give 150 percent. If they don't have the right dress, they'll go out in whatever they have. If there are no microphones, they'll still put on a show. They are people who put their heart and soul in what they do.

I don't tweet, Twitter, email, Facebook, look book, no kind of book. I have a land line phone at my home - that's the only phone I have. If my phone rang every day like everyone else around me, I would lose my mind.

I have to go 150 percent or nothing at all.

A diva is someone who is a perfectionist, who does her best in her craft.

I decided to always sing in the back with the chorus and never went up front because I had trouble performing.

There's not much longevity in music today. It's so easy to go in, put some pretentious lyrics on, with people saying the same thing over and over and over.

Once I stopped dwelling on what I didn't have, on what I thought I was going to lose, and began to give freely, everything opened up for me. Everything began to flow into my life.

I love Canadians because I don't see very much racism in Canada.

I know how to put it on when it comes to interviews and performing because I have to. But I'm pretty laid back.

Women are strong now. Women are dominating the charts, and women are doing it for themselves. We're kicking butt and taking no prisoners.

I keep showing decade after decade that I am a real performer.

Whenever I go out, so many people who respect me ask me what to do in a certain situation. A lot of times, I didn't know the answers because sometimes I was going through the same sort of thing. But then later on, I would think of things that people told me.

I've never been with a woman, so I guess I'm straight, OK? But I'm straight enough to know the difference between right and wrong. I am straight enough to know that if you want to marry whoever you want to marry, you should be able to marry whoever you want to marry

Tell Aretha I’ll be praying for herBecause she needs Jesus!I love her.

I want to be remembered as a woman who was fair and always gave 150 percent, no matter what I did.

All these little heifers who can't sing are called ‘divas’.

All I do is stay in the kitchen and cook. I don't go there to party.

Peace of mind just can't be bought. Trust me: Even if your conscience doesn't stop you from playing dirty to get what you want, once you get it, it will keep you from enjoying it. As my mother used to say, "A good conscience is God's eye." Which is why I always prefer a loss to an underhanded gain; the one brings pain at the moment, the other for all time.

When I was married, I wasn't loving myself. Now I'm in love with myself. I will get married again.

People with no humor, they're outta my life.

In matters of the heart it is always better to want something you don't have than to have something you don't want.

I don't feel as though I have to prove anything to anybody.

I'm very spontaneous.

I can't do some of the songs that younger girls like Mary J. Blige and Beyonce are doing. They have their own place and I have my own place.

I was a shy kid with a broom handle that I pretended was a microphone.

All I can tell you really is if you get to the point where someone is telling you that you are not great or not good enough, just follow your heart and don't let anybody crush your dream.

I'm so grounded, it's sad.

That's another lesson I've learned the hard way. All relationships will die if they aren't nurtured. Just as a flower will die if it's not watered. Because love is demonstration, not declaration.

I'll perform all the way to the grave.